Selfish
by GoddessofSnark
Summary: Marley thinks of how he was too Selfish. Slashy.


A/N: So I dont think anyone owns them. This was written last year, but i've updated a bit of it.

The room is so cold, I don't see how you can stand it so cold. I guess it matches our cold hearts. You look so old, so haggard sitting there, immersed in your work, not caring about anything but your work, not even yourself. You just let yourself waste away in that counting house that we shared, that we still share although you don't know it. I'm still here with you, in spirit at least, I'm still here watching over you, trying to stop you from going down the same path I did.

Alas that I cannot actively stop you from doing anything. I wish that I could, I wish I could thrown the coins that you have gathered arount you, yur counting books into your face, and then into the fire, and tell you that these will all bring about your downfall, same as they have brought about mine. I am now cursed to wander the world wrapped in chains, the chains that these coins themselves have forged, the chains that I have forged link by link, yard by yard out of my greed.

I have been told that I can appear to you tonight, that I have been granted the power to cross between the barrier separating my world from yours. If only I wouldn't appear in a spirit form, if only I could be the man that you once loved, not a shadow of him. They days I've sat by your side, watching over you, watching as you tally things in that wretched book of yours, books that have my handwriting next to yours, books that I had as much to do with as you.

I had as much to do with how miserable we lived as you do. Only now you're the only one bringing it upon yourself. I started you on it though, I was the one that started you on being greedy, that made you the monster you have become. I was the one that taught you that having a house, that having a family was something sentimental. I lost you the only one that you loved and I regret that. I wanted you only for myself, I wanted to have you all to myself.

I was too selfish. I was too greedy. I had you, and I should have been content with having you near me. But I wanted to have you all to myself, with nothing and no one to interrupt. It was I who put the idea to buy Fezziwig out into your mind, it was I who goaded you into staying late so many nights, while knowing that your Belle was waiting for you when you got home, knowing the damage that it was doing to your relationship.

But you never mentioned anything about it, you never said that anything was wrong. You gave no clue of it until that day, that Christmas eve when we went to buy out Fezziwig and she came in. I watched the whole scene, secretly glad, secretly gloating that I did it, that I got rid of the last thing that stopped me from having you all to myself. Your life centered around your work after that, and thus centered around me. I became your only friend.

At the same time that I became your only friend, I also became your worst enemy. I became the only person you had any sort of contact with. I became the only person you would talk to without giving orders. You already were my whole life, I already was madly in love with you. I already knew that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you, no matter what it would take. I knew that you were the only one for me, no matter how wrong it may be.

I don't quite remember when I first realized what it was that I felt for you. All I remember was looking at you-nay watching you-one day, and realizing the perfect way your face looked in the candle light. And no matter how hard I tried to erase that image from my mind it haunted me, tempted me, taunted me, your face, your whole body teased me to just give in and make a move on you, fufil the desires that had slowly but steadily been mounting for the longest time.

I was never like the other boys, and I knew it, but you-you had so much to become, and I didn't. I was exiled from the start, and from the minute I realized what I was, that I was doomed to either be forced into a sham of a marriage or live as an old man for my entire life, i willfully cut all my ties to the world, and money became my only love. I was shunned enough, I didn't need to be arrested and shunned even more for something that I had little control over.

You changed all that, after I met you, I stoped caring if it was wrong or right, all I wanted was for you to be with me, and you were for a time. It was all too short of a time though. The first time we kissed was a year to the day that I passed from this world. I wish we had more time together, I wish that I could have told you I loved you more times that I did, I wish you would have believed me for most of them. I wish you would have loved me back the way that I loved you.

You were almost horrified the first time I finally gave into the temptation that you provided. We had both been more than a little drunk, I believe it was during our mockery of a christmas party, it was just you and I, sharing a bottle of ale as we whiled away the hours checking our books for another countless time. Your nephew Fred had stopped by earlier that day, and he had hung a sprig of mistletoe over the doorway out of festive spirit, and as we were walking out the door, I noticed it. And I grabbed you and pulled you to me, savoring that moment for as long as possible.

You were always so distant up until my final night on this earth. But yet you let me have my way with you, you never objected when I kissed you. And the times when you'd give in and kiss me, an delightful turn, a delicious twist. But you were always so reserved, so afraid of loving. I loved you with my whole heart, you were the only person to slide beneath the wall, the only person to melt the icy barrier that I've built around my heart.

Now I want to save you from the horror that I've suffered through. Now I want to protect you. I want to save you, I want to be the one to warn you about what I've gone through. This has been utter hell, and I don't want to see you suffer the way I have. I deserve to suffer, I turned you into the monster that you've become. I was so selfish, so greedy in wanting you that I made you into me, I turned you into the exact thing that I am being punished eternally for.

I tried so hard to make you love me, and me alone that I failed to see what was right in front of me. I refused to accept the fact that maybe we just weren't meant to be together. But yet at the same time, you loved me. You still loved me, through it all, you still cared for me, you were still the one that I could turn to every night, you were still the one that shared my bed so many nights, you were still the one that turned to me whenever you needed comfort most.

I was your rock, your protector. I always was, you always came running to me from the time we were boys. From the time we first met we were friends, and from the time we were first friends, I was always the stronger one, you were so small so weak. And you were so tragic as well, you strove to be so much better than how you were born. Your father in the debtors prison and your sister in the workhouses. And no mother. I couldn't help but want to help you.

I was always so generous when I was younger. I should have never stopped being generous, I should have never stopped being the kind young man I was. There was a proverb I once heard about the man who had nothing was the one who gave everything. I had you as my only friend, we were both shunned, you for your size, i for more reasons than i care to think of. And so I gave everything. I should have never let material wealth get in the way of being a good man. Instead I found myself becoming more and more obsessed with those damned coins that have forged the chains that bind my soul so tightly in death, the chains that I must lug with me weighting me down the way greed so weighted me down in life.

I was too selfish, and I only learned that too late. If only I could tell you all of this, when I appear to you tonight. But I know that I will not have the time to even let you know the slightest shred of all of this, the things I should have told you in life, the things I should have mentioned to you when I still had the chance to. I should have told you how much I loved you oh so long ago, but I never did, I was too selfish, I thought you would already know, I thought you would love me back.

I love you, and I always will. Even in death I watch over you, I watch you working, and I curse myself for being so greedy and sharing my greed with you. there was a point in time when you were happy poor, and I stole that happiness from you. I was too selfish for you, I was too selfish for my own good. I wanted you to love me, nothing more. And in striving for that love, I forged the chains that bind my soul forever.


End file.
